China home to highly sustainable skyscraper

It has been estimated that China will need to build the equivalent of "a Chicago" every year until 2030 if it continues on its current path of rapid urbanization that will see some 250m more people move from China's villages to its cities over that period.

The skyline in GuangzhouPhoto: ALAMY

By Peter Foster in Beijing

10:30AM BST 08 Jun 2011

The accompanying construction boom will suck up untold millions of tonnes of steel, copper, concrete, timber and oil, driving prices on the world's commodity markets and setting up a fiercely-fought global competition for natural resources.

Every week to 10 days, China opens a new coal-fired power station to provide the heat, light and electricity needed to power these glittering new skylines, with their offices and houses filled with computers, televisions and other power-hungry amenities.

Currently 95 per cent of existing buildings in China are not energy efficient, according to a 2009 report by the Asia Business council, however in recent years the Chinese government has laid far greater emphasis on building greener and better.

Progress is expected to be slow, but China will have a highly sustainable skyscraper, the 71-storeyPearl River Tower, which will be completed later this year in the manufacturing hub of Guangzhou to international acclaim.

According to its designers, the building stands as a beacon of what is possible – and necessary – as the world strives to uses natural resources more sustainably.

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The curved sides of the 1,015ft tower, which is the headquarters of the Guangdong Tobacco Company, are specially sculpted to direct wind through two pairs of openings in the building's two mechanical floors that house wind-turbines to generate energy for the building.

The buildings designers' describe the tower as a feat made possible not only by the windturbines, but by a series of other contributing factors including double facade curtain wall, radiant ceiling, solar panels, daylight harvesting and underfloor ventilation.